Montgomery High School's Colby Ciarrocca, right, is The Times' co-Female Athlete of the Week.Amanda Brown/For The Star-Ledger

Sports are an important part of the Ciarrocca household.

Kim Ciarrocca is the director of athletics and chairwoman of the physical education department at Stuart Country Day School.

Kirk Ciarrocca is a college football coach currently in charge of the running backs at the University of Delaware.

Their daughter, Colby, is an outstanding athlete in soccer. For leading the Montgomery High School girls’ soccer team into the state championship round, Colby Ciarrocca has been named as a Times’ Female Athlete of the Week. She scored the game-winner to lift Montgomery (22-1-2) over Lenape in the state Group IV semifinal. The Cougars will meet Ridge today at 5:30 p.m. in the state championship game at The College of New Jersey.

“Colby Ciarrocca has been a prolific goal scorer this year,” said MHS coach Jeremy Beardsley. “She has shattered our single-season record for goals and will go down as our greatest goal scorer we have ever seen.”

She chose a sport different from the two (field hockey and lacrosse) that her mother excelled at when she was known as Kim Lambdin. “She played lacrosse on the World Cup team,” Colby said of her mother, who has been inducted into the Temple University and Plymouth-Whitemarsh High School Halls of Fame after all-star careers in both sports.

“She supports me in my decisions.”

The younger Ciarrocca has already created quite a sensation on the soccer circuit. Just a junior, she has made a commitment to Vanderbilt University.

Even though Stuart isn’t known for soccer, Ciarrocca said she had no desire to join her mother on the campus of the Princeton Township school.

“I love Montgomery,” she said.

The feeling is mutual, especially on the soccer field where the forward has produced 31 goals and 17 assists.

“Colby’s strengths as a forward are that she works incredibly hard,” Beardsley said. “She is driven to be the best she can be. She has worked on all aspects of her game and this has developed her into a more complete soccer player.

“Colby is also a fantastic teammate. She is humble, incredibly coachable, and always there to lend a positive voice to a teammate.”

She has been a cog in this “special year.”

“From the beginning of the season we had high expectations,” Ciarrocca said. “I thought from the beginning we had a spark and Wednesday’s game (a 2-1 victory over Lenape in a state semifinal) ignited a new spark.”

The soccer spark began for Ciarrocca quite simply.

“I think I was just kicking the ball around one day and it stuck,” she said.

Her spot as a forward also was an immediate fit.

“I’ve always played forward,” Ciarrocca said.

A member of the Players Development Academy, Ciarrocca keeps soccer a part of her repertoire throughout the year.